Avatar (the one with the blue aliens) is such a weird franchise
It showed up out of nowhere, made the most bank in history (for a movie), refused to explain and disappeared for like 15 years, then came back out of nowhere with a sequel movie, a AAA game, and like 3 more movies in the works.
Edit: I think it now has like a Lego line too?
Well it had James Cameron as a director which automatically meant was going to make money. Also it was technically very impressive for the time which was kind of the point. Cameron made a huge deal of how this was a story that he'd wanted to tell for ages but hadn't been able to until the technology got to the point where he could use it.
After the movie came out there wasn't really any obvious path forward. It wasn't supposed to be a franchise it was just a movie that stood on its own. So nothing happened for years.
Then things like the volume came along and it started getting used even in TV productions, and suddenly a whole new level of capability arose and so they decided that they would make another movie only this time why stop at just one?
The first one used some crazy tech that is now regularly part of making video games. The movie itself is rather mid, IMO (I mean, it's just Fern Gully but sci-fi instead of fantasy 🤷♂️), but the stuff that went into making it is fascinating as hell.
it is unapologetically in favor of preserving nature, anticapitalist, and anti military. the boys from chapo trap house like it and point out that its one of the few movies with a mainstream theatrical release in which the audience is made to cheer on the blue furry hippie throwing a bunch of US marines out of a helicopter to their death.
Anticapitalist that made over 2 Billion dollars...
Keeping unobtainium in the script unironically met bizarrely little criticism.
If you were late teens / early 20's or older when it first came out, I don't think it that weird.
It was bloody amazing. And then we've just all been waiting for it until the sequels, which are just now starting to roll in. The second one was a bit of a disappointment (bro) in my opinion, but I'm hoping the third one will be a positive surprise.
Basically I went to watch it for nostalgia, as I think a lot did.
AAA-game? Aren't there like lots of Avatar games?
Yeah, 2009 there was one, online shut down for it in 2014.
Guess you're talking about "the frontiers of Pandora" from 2023?
There's also "Pandora rising" from 2020.
The sequels were always in the works. The first movie was an experience and now people are just chasing that high again.
Hell, there's still tons of people waiting on the continuation on what happens to Jon Snow in the books after he's stabbed. That's still in the works with George, hopefully. Since like 2011.
i was, but i also saw disney's pocahontas as a kid. so uh... it was just that, but in 3d.
Yeah I saw Pocahontas in theaters as well. Loved it. Dad took me. Thanks for unlocking some memories of my late pops. Thanks, for real.
Prolly primed me to like Avatar tbh, or just liked it for the same reasons.
Yes, the similarities are remarkable, but it's not literally the same story, just mostly similar beats.
But I needn't remind you that a majority of all stories are more or less the monomyth aka the hero's journey:
In narratology and comparative mythology, the hero's quest or hero's journey, also known as the monomyth, is the common template of stories that involve a hero who goes on an adventure, is victorious in a decisive crisis, and comes home changed or transformed.
Very much applies to Jakesully in this Avatar as well. Ofc there's much more that matches up with Pocahontas, I'm just pointing out that "true originality" doesn't exist, we seem to enjoy more or less similar stories/story structures, and the thing people loved in Avatar was the millions they spend imagining a rather complete world with a tad more complexity than Disney's -95 animated Pocahontas had. Although it waa beautiful as well. But the world building and animation used doesn't really compare, does it?
I wonder why people don't make the same argument for sports players. "It's just [previous champion] who looks different. Yeah it's totally different but like... is it totally different? Yes, it is, one is subjective one is objective. This comparison blows.
Food? We invented putting things on bread and have been doing variations of it since. All pretty similar, but also, a million different types. Bread and some filling / topping.
Anyway yeah the first movie is more or less Pocahontas. But like. I don't see how that matters. It does explain why the second sucked in comparison though. Doing something that has been already established to work but improving on it is the thing.
I only hope they go back from Jakesully family man to at least some semblance of heroes journey in the third. Maybe it'll be one of his kids idk.
Anyway No spoilers for 3 guys I'm not watching the trailer or reading anything
It’s all a lot less fantastical when you compare it to Pocahontas:
Yeah, that's kind of the point? Was the comparison between the Na'Vi and native Americans too subtle for you to notice before you saw this meme?
Not for me personally. Just find it funny how 1:1 it is with the original. This meme has been around since the year the movie came out.
Dances with Smurfs
But you could do this with every story/movie trope that's been repeated throughout our species history. The concept of retelling stories in different contexts is itself not new but for sure reason Avatar gets overly criticised for it.
You don't see the same criticisms for every bank heist movie that all follow the same basic premises as each other. I just did it a bit weird why so many people are against this particular trope. Is it because it tries to deal with our history of oppression and colonisation? I honestly don't know.
I doubt there are any truly original stories that couldn't be shown to be a retelling of another. I would even argue that some genres wouldn't exist if this wasn't a thing.
You don't see the same criticisms for every bank heist movie that all follow the same basic premises as each other
That's because I generally don't have to hear about every bank heist movie; you can't avoid Avatar
For me, I will dog on any kind of retelling like this. If you’re not teaching anything new and are just retelling the story for profit, I don’t care about your story. There were no new story beats and no twists that caught me off guard.
When the movie was new, anytime you threw it shade, the first follow-up question was, “Well, did you see it in IMAX 3D?” That shouldn’t matter. If your story relies on visual gimmick to make it anything more than a reskin, I’m not interested.
I have the same feeling towards the live action Disney movies. They’re not adding anything new. I see about 5-10 new movies a year now compared to the 20-30 I used to because so little is not just a rehash of something from last year.
Pretty sure it now has a theme park or something, doesn't it?
It's bizarre how much "stuff" there is for the blue people Avatar franchise, considering what a tiny lasting cultural impact the original movie had.
The original movie was an incredible tech demo. It was an utterly forgettable movie. I had no desire to bother watching the sequel.
Sure, the movies aren't very deep, but the world-building and visuals are pretty great. The emotional beats tend to hit as they should too so it's entertaining fluff. Sure, I enjoy a fancy steak, but I'm also going to fully enjoy cotton candy at the carnival too.
Yeah, i remember going to see it mostly because of 3D (which probably helped a lot in becoming one of the most successful movies ever, thanks to the novelty and higher ticket price).
But left so little impact that i can hardly remember anything about it and have no interest whatsoever in seeing the sequels.
The theme park in animal kingdom was fine
The Pandora section of Animal Kingdom is pretty cool, especially at night. And the Flight of Passage ride is incredible, a very easy suspension of disbelief once you’re on the “banshee” and feeling it breathe beneath you, and the wind and the spray of water as you fly.
Say what you will about Disney, they know how to make a theme park experience.
Say what you will about Disney, they know how to make a theme park experience.
The only Disney park I've been to is Hong Kong. And to be honest, it was a very subpar experience. Much worse than the other parks I've been to like Movie World & Dreamworld in Australia, or Lotte World in Korea.
"Showed up out of nowhere", ie. in development since the mid 90's; "made the most bank", ie. made the 2nd most bank; "disappeared", ie. Cameron said that there would be 4 sequels and that they're being worked on; "came back out of nowhere", ie. the first sequel came out more or less when it was supposed to, and Cameron said in 2020 that filming on Avatar 3 was nearly finished.
i feel like the feeling of them coming "out of nowhere" and "disappearing" is created by how little cultural impact those movies managed to create. like give me a single quote, anything memorable from the story itself. we all remember it is a beautiful film to watch, but the plot might as well be a theme park ride around an alien world
nobody talks about it, there is nothing to talk about
like give me a single quote, anything memorable from the story itself
Well there was the part where the… uh… the guy, whatshisface said…
Wait, no… ok well how about when the… um… there was that one part in… err, either the first or the second movie, one of the aliens did… umm…
You know what, I'll get back to you on this one
"JakeSully" - Blue catgirl Gamora
See this? That's Unobtainium.
Isn't the story alien sideboob? I still remember that, very meaningful
"I see you" is an insanely easy quote to remember from this movie
me_irl
This should be the cover photo/thumbnail/whatever for the show "Um, Actually" lol
Man, it's just so friggin boring. I gave up on the second movie halfway through and I struggled through the first one. I don't understand why it became a global blockbuster.
In “How To With John Wilson” he finds an actual Avatar fan group who like to dress up as blue aliens, but it still felt super niche for a multi billion dollar film series. It’s like everyone simply forgets about it when there’s not one on in cinemas.
I absolutely love that show but I can't recall that episode at all. Guess it's time for a rewatch!
I want to hear the original version of the soundtrack. I do not care about the actual film at all, but supposedly Cameron hired a bunch of leading ethnomusicologists to attempt to create something unlike any music on Earth, only to then ditch the majority of what they made because it sounded too weird
That would be a fun director's cut
Am I the only one here that has never seen it or understands what the hype is about?
It was another white saviour movie. It was very strange and not something I ever understood
I'm going off of deteriorated memory but... space pocahontas where the natives of the planet that the humans are invading are tall blue vaguely mammalian-fish looking humanoids with a weird multipurpose tail for controlling animals and apparently also for sex according to supposed axed scene. paraplegic human uses weird technology to control the body of one or something to complete the white man saves the day even though white man cause the problem in the first place trope. I dunno about the sequel maybe he permanently stays in the alien body or something and has alien kids, who knows.
It's not about the story, it's about the sfx.
Watch James Cameron's movies like the abyss, Terminator2 and Titanic. (There's others as well if you want to put in more effort)
He's a visionary director and I just mean his own vision, Avatar was an idea he wanted to see on screen but was unhappy with the technology until he felt it was ready to tell the idea he had.
Like some other things, by today's standards everyone else who saw what he did have been able to refine and expand on what he did so it may seem in unremarkable, but he finally decided to do the biggie when he felt the tech had come far enough for him to do his vision and it made Bank. So. Much. Bank
Again not because it's an amazing original story, comparisons to fern gully were immediate even when it was new, but it was something that sits in a divide of how sfx can be used to tell a story in a way that people hadn't otherwise shown. Even with a really unremarkable plot
Maybe its because Cameron is not one of my favorite directors. I love T2, of course but I can't say the same about Titanic because (you guessed it) I still have not watched it and also didn't buy into the hype when it was released. I remember that movie theaters were booked solid for weeks and you couldn't get a ticket. No movie is that good or justifies that kind of hype, so I have skipped it so far.
I watched about 5 minutes of it in an electronics store before getting bored. If I'm not mistaken it is Dances with Wolves in space. There's also a big blue guy who hangs dong.
Dances with wolves, Ferngully, pocahontas, take your pick lol
It was a very pretty movie
There are dozens of us
It's shit except the visuals
It's not "shit." That's just an over correction to its relative success for its mediocrity. Excluding the visuals, it's fine. It's not stellar, not terrible, just... fine. Simple. There are plenty of worse movie plots, dialogue and acting out there. It's nowhere near unwatchable.
It's a vehicle for the visuals and technology showcasing on a basic film frame, yes. But, it's allowed to be really good at one thing and appreciated for that.
Like a plain chip in some bomb-ass dip. You could've scooped it on a dirty shoe and someone would have licked it clean. But, you gave me a plain chip instead, which is better... even if boring. So, thanks.
Are we not going to talk about the fact that the logo uses something that is almost identical to the Papyrus font?
"I KNOW WHAT YOU DID!!"
You're assuming there are people who remember what the logo looks like.
Nyeh-heh-heh
People think it's so cool to shit on this series and have nothing to say about the Marvel dogshit lol
I saw the first movie, forgot almost completely what it was about. But I have to admit I thought it would be about the the Airbender. Half of the movie I felt stupid and cheated at the same time... Probably why I don't remember what it was about.
That's even weirder really, the movie was so forgettable.
Nope. I knew what I was seeing.
I usually like to challenge anyone who said they liked it to name two chsracters. I think one person ever has succeeded.
🤷♂️
Well, there's Sully, and, uh... Well the blue people are called the Navi, does that count?
Jake and Colonel Quaritch.
The problem is, the latter is a name recycled from the Aliens franchise, and Jake is so generic that it's kind of a gimme.
It didn't help that it came out around the same time as the ATLA movie.
Avatar didn’t come out of nowhere at all. It is made by one of the most beloved and successful film makers in history. The hype leading up to that movie was off the charts.
I think it made so much money at the box office because it was so visually stunning (for the time) and no one had made a movie like that at that point. It was very much a movie everyone said to go watch on the big screen in 3D, ideally IMAX 3D. I never did and only watched it on a DVD borrowed from my wife’s friend 6 or 7 years ago, and came away less impressed. Like, it’s fine, but the movie itself isn’t exactly the greatest story ever told, and the visuals, while groundbreaking at the time, are now pretty standard.
I'm not the only one that thinks this!
that
*who
There are more than that specific incidence. Though ar't obliged to thumbprint that instance.
Also, it’s an original movie. It’s not an adaptation or a sequel of any sorts. No other movie in top 50 highest grossing movies is an original. Closest is Titanic, but that’s half based on a real event.
Same filmmaker, Titanic (likely?) helped pave the way for Avatar {create a blockbuster such as Titanic, all sorts of doors open}
Yea, the story isn't exactly original.
The game isn’t good. Triple AAA or not.
That's not what I said
I didn’t say you did. I was merely stating an opinion.
Given that they could accelerate masses to relativistic speeds. It never made sense to me why they bothered to do anything other than shatter the planet (a Chevy engine block could do that job at those speeds) and then collect the now more readily available unobtainium from the vacuum of space with no fighting required or any loses of any kind.
Nah. Even if you had the ability to shatter a planet (it would take a lot more mass hitting the planet than that of every automobile ever made) it would just clump back together after a while because, ya know, gravity. And now you’ve sloshed everything around in a molten mess so it’s even harder to process.
Technically humans are the aliens in that franchise. The blue folks are the native inhabitants.
/s
Idk, I like the big special effects rollercoasters that James Cameron and Co. have made.
The first time he flies a banshee in the first movie is a pretty cool scene, the battle in the floating mountains was badass, and the sheer scale of everything on Pandora is incredible to see (even if it's all CGI).
The second one was still a CGI rollercoaster that was fun to watch. I liked Spider cause he was actually kinda badass. The underwater scenes were spectacular to watch and there was more world building with the water navi.
I'll be interested to see what these other new navi are like and how they fit into everything else. The trailer makes it look like they're going to partner with the RDA somehow. I kinda want to know why.
I was genuinely surprised the second one made money. I thought nobody would still care about the franchise. But alas, sometimes the majority like movies that I don't and vice versa. I'm not going to be an idiot and go on posts about Avatar saying "nobody asked for more Avatar movies". I didn't ask for more. But they're making tons of money so clearly, somebody is asking for more.
The thing that I think a lot of people forget about the first Avatar is that it was pretty much the first big blockbuster to be available with those RealD 3D glasses. I distinctly remember wanting to go see it so I could check out RealD and find out if it lived up to the hype.
Of course, it had the James Cameron name recognition, so it was probably going to be pretty successful regardless, but I don't know if it would have been quite so record-shattering if it weren’t for the novelty of RealD, combined with the higher ticket price of 3D showings.
Yeah, one of the nice things about it was that not only was it proper 3D, but it was a showcase of how 3D could and should be done. If anyone didn't watch it in 3D in the theaters, the only other option for seeing it as intended is VR now.
I'm in the camp of people that has watched it and the second one multiple times. Made sure to catch them in theater first, I rarely bother to see movies in theater. But at home I watch them in my VR theater in perfect 3D, the visuals are actually better in my setup(4k raw videofile on Virtual Desktop, tuned to the exact size and distance I want the screen to be), the sound isn't quite what a theater would do, but mostly cuz I don't actually like how "big" they go with the sound at theaters. I'd rather it feel like I'm there, than being so over the top. My audio at home doesn't have to drown out a crowd of people.
I think the whole experience in VR is better than theater, the movie presents better at a reasonable volume and soundstage.
I like how RealD looks well enough, but the glasses tended to give me a mild headache after a while. I've been able to wear VR headsets without much issue in the handful of times I've been able to try them, so maybe that would work better, but I don't think I've actually worn one for multiple hours at a time, so who knows.
A very overated movie by the ones who are fans. "Great visuals" they say, like if Avatar were the first movie ever using CGI. This movie is, in fact as OP says, a very weird franchise. Has success out of nowhere and no one ever bring this movie when talking about "what's your favorite movie", "what's your favorite movie soundtrack", "what's your favorite story from a movie", "what's your favorite scene in a movie". I dare you to do those questions to people and see by yourselves. A very big money wash if you ask me.
Shit movie.
They pushed ocean sims to the max in the last one, I enjoy watching cgi/vfx idrc about the plot, also the naavi are hot, tall alien baddies when